Open-world KITA RPG (role-playing game) Where Winds Meet by Chinese game company NetEase Games is gaining traction among Korean gamers through word of mouth. Following last year's Black Myth: Wukong, which changed perceptions of Chinese-made console and PC games, Where Winds Meet is being called the "post-Wukong," continuing the rise of Chinese AAA (blockbuster) games. Unlike Wukong, which was a packaged action game, Where Winds Meet is designed as an open-world live-service RPG, proving its potential for long-term success.
According to data from PC game platform Steam on the 19th, Where Winds Meet has about 99,000 cumulative reviews, 88% of which are positive. Korean-language reviews number close to 3,000, showing high participation among languages other than English, Chinese, and Russian. At launch, the peak concurrent users hit 251,008, and even two months later the daily peak remains in the 80,000 to 100,000 range, keeping it in the upper ranks of Steam's "most played games." In just the first month after launch, it generated about $34 million (about 50 billion won) in revenue, and in December its Steam global revenue ranking surged as high as No. 2. With a so-called "mild monetization" policy and steady large-scale updates, it is holding 6th place on the chart in the second week of January.
Where Winds Meet has made its presence felt in the domestic console market, where AAA game competition is fierce. Right after release, it stayed in the top 5 for an extended period on the Korea PlayStation Store's "most downloaded games" and "popular games" charts. Analysts say it exceeded the genre constraints of traditional KITA to meet domestic users' expectations in graphics, action, and freedom. Mobility using light-footwork, wall-climbing and swimming, and tactical combat centered on parrying and evasion led to community and review comments such as "the KITA version of Zelda" and "reminds me of Ghost of Tsushima."
The reach of Where Winds Meet widened further after the mobile version's release. After launching the mobile version on Dec. 12 last year, it ranked No. 1 in free game popularity in app stores across 60 countries worldwide. According to NetEase, Inc., as of mid-December 2025, one month after the mobile launch, global monthly active users (MAU) surpassed 15 million. Korea is also one of the key strategic markets, with steady new inflows as it maintains a spot around the top 10, including 7th place in Google Play popularity rankings. Full support for cross-play and cross-progression (mirroring saved progress across platforms) among PC, console, and mobile is credited with greatly improving accessibility.
Where Winds Meet raised the bar for KITA games in technical execution and content design. The open world built on Unreal Engine 5 meticulously recreates China during the Five Dynasties and Ten Kingdoms period, and more than 10,000 NPCs (non-player characters) in the game use an artificial intelligence (AI) system. Depending on the player's choices and actions, NPCs' memories and relationships change, and their roles split into collaborator, adversary, or advisor rather than simple quest givers. This interaction, which departs from fixed-dialogue RPG conventions, is considered a key element that makes the game world feel like a "living space." Traditional cultural elements such as tai chi, light-footwork, and acupuncture are woven into gameplay, and combat is designed around parrying to maximize action.
NetEase, Inc. moved to expand service for Where Winds Meet with its "1.2 major update" on the 9th, adding the new area "Guryumun Garrison," the final chapter of the Kaifeng region, and a preseason for Alliance War. It is also investing in global branding by holding offline events in major cities such as Tokyo, Singapore, and Bangkok. In particular, a localization strategy that includes full Korean voice-over dubbing aimed at the Korean market is cited as a decisive factor that ignited explosive responses from domestic users.
Industry officials see the success of Where Winds Meet not as a one-off title win but as evidence of a structural shift in China's game industry. If Black Myth: Wukong raised the ceiling for Chinese games with technology, Where Winds Meet has proven sustainability and scalability as a live-service RPG. Notably, Where Winds Meet has drawn attention for staying high in sales rankings even while rejecting a pay-to-win (P2W) model that directly boosts combat power through spending and instead adopting an appearance-focused business model (BM) based on outfits and weapon skins.
A game industry official said, "Chinese games have already secured a user base among Koreans in the mobile market with titles like Genshin Impact," adding, "now, like Where Winds Meet, they are expanding across console and PC, going head-to-head with domestic game companies in both technology and polish." The official added, "Chinese games are no longer just an overseas export competition issue for domestic game companies, but a structural threat that is encroaching on Korea's domestic market itself."